Misadventure in Quarantine, a True Story

Last Wednesday my housemate found out that someone he’d gone for a walk with had tested positive for Covid. He got tested immediately, and we are still awaiting results. 

I have been home from work while we wait, either in my room (my housemate and I trying to distance as much as we can), or well, in my room. 

Sometimes adventure comes from climbing tall mountains or thru-hiking hundreds of miles across a state. Other times, you encounter situations of survival and peril without leaving the house.

I’m hardly a comedian, but I hope this makes someone out there laugh. 

It was 7:30 at night, I was watching Outlander in bed, appreciating the new balsam scented candle I had stress-ordered when blood started gushing out my nose. 

It is always infernally dry in our apartment, and I’m prone to bloody noses. I reached for a tissue only to feel my hand scrape the bottom of an empty box. I pressed my other hand to my nose in a futile attempt to stem the bleeding and made a dash for the bathroom. 

I jumped up and ran to push open my bedroom door, only…. It didn’t open.

 I tried again, nothing. I was trapped.

This house was built in 1912, it’s an old “cure cottage” for tuberculosis patients. It’s a charming little place, it has so much charm that my curtains even blow around when my windows are closed. 

The door knob to my room had fallen off ages ago, but the latch never worked to begin with so I hadn’t bothered to fix it. Well, at least the latch had never worked up until now. 

I was torn between wanting to scream in frustration and burst out laughing. If this wasn’t a perfect metaphor for 2020 then I didn’t know what was.

I grabbed a sock and held it to my nose. My face, hands, clothes, and the floor were now smeared with blood. 

My housemate was home, but I would be damned if I needed to ask for help just to get out of my room. This was far too embarrassing. 

He’s also the type that passes out at the sight of blood, and at this point it looked like I’d been stabbed. That could really make for an interesting evening. 

Quietly I tried to body slam the door to force it open. Well, as quietly as one can body slam a door. 

It didn’t budge. 

I looked around, at least this was the first floor. I opened the window and put a leg up on the sill, wondering if I could possibly pull this off without my housemate noticing or the neighbors calling the police. 

Someone climbing out of a window with blood stained clothes might look a tad suspicious. 

Then it hit me, paintbrushes. 

A whole jar of them sat at my feet, all different sizes. I just needed to find the right one to push into the hole the doorknob used to sit in and turn the latch. 

This just might work.

Five paintbrushes later and the latch clicked. The door swung open, and I was saved. 

My housemate hadn’t noticed a thing…. and this might be how he finds out it happened (Hi Ryan).

That ends my tale of survival, ingenuity, and valor from a little cure cottage in Saranac Lake. 

Update: Today I was sitting in bed and saw my neighbor carry a unicycle into his apartment. It appears he’s about to have some quarantine misadventures of his own (rock on Henry). 

Photo credit: Henry Liebers